The Permaculture Realized Podcast

The Permaculture Realized Podcast delivers practical skills and knowledge to build your ecologically restorative homestead, farm, neighborhood, or business based on Permaculture concepts and methods. Our guests work in many various fields including plant propagation, alternative technology, ecosystem restoration, permaculture design, energy conservation, policy-making, community organizing, animal husbandry, market vegetable gardening, homesteading, organic farming, education and more. Collectively we are developing the structures and systems to supply our basic human needs in a way that improves the health of the ecosystem and ourselves. Dive right in!

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Todays guest is Lina Bird who is very active in the Washington DC branch of the Citizens Climate Lobby. The Citizens Climate Lobby is a non-profit, non-partisan grassroots organization with chapters all over the country, with the aim of lobbying for national policies to address climate change. One of their primary policies is a Carbon Tax and Dividend.

This past winter I had the pleasure of visiting my friends Randy and Libby Buchler and their family at their farm, Shady Grove Farm in Michigans Upper Peninsula. In 2009, they recieved a notice for alleged zoning violations regarding their agricultural activity. Through a ton of research and collaborations, they were finally able to win back their Right to Farm in a 2012 court case. Today Randy Buchler joins us to share their story of how they achieved success.

Today we’re talking to Nathan Ayers who teaches Permaculture to students of all ages in Michigan. This is Nathans second time on the show, and it’s always a great time having him. If you like this one, be sure to check out Episode 18 as well where we discussed water solutions to the Flint, MI Water Crisis. Today we talk about Nathan and his brother Nick’s exciting new project; We Are the Forest. In addition to their work in the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area, they are also involved on Beaver Island.

This weeks episode is about how to start your own edible permaculture plant nursery with special guest, Sean Dembrosky of Edible Acres. Edible Acres is a small homestead and plant nursery that Sean runs in the Finger Lakes area of New York State. Today, he shares with us some great tips to getting started or improving our own plant nurseries.

Today we’re talking to Peter Allen who runs Mastodon Valley Farm in Wisconsin. Before getting in to regenerative farming, Peter was a student of ecology and complex systems theory, so he brings a unique an informed perspective to the use of animal agriculture as a method of managing landscape for ecological health.

Today’s guest is a good friend of mine who started up a bicycle powered community compost pickup business here in Northern Michigan. We discuss his experience with starting up the project, why this model has a ton of oppotunity for others to step up and replicate it, and tips on how you can start your own!

Today’s guest Bryce Ruddock, is an author, educator and avid forest gardener from Wisconsin. Today Bryce shares his favorite plants to grow from among the hundreds of species that he’s experimented with at his home. I definitely recommend getting your notebooks out for this episode because Bryce shares so many great species and resources that deserve a closer look by anyone interested in gardening like an ecosystem.

This episode is a follow up on episode 27. If you missed it I highly recommend you check it out. In that episode we did an analysis of what humans need to flourish. So now, using what we learned from the past episode, this week we’re going to go into kind of the goal setting part of the design process if you want to look at it that way, but basically just looking at how we can respond to the situation that we’re in. How we can adapt.

Today’s guest is Peter Bane who is the president of the Permaculture Insitute of North America, he wrote the Permaculture Handbook, literally, he has built and lived in eco-villages and self-sufficient homesteads for decades. and has taught dozens and dozens of courses and workshops all over the world. He’s the real deal, as you’ll soon learn.

Todays guest is Albert Bates who we spoke to last year because he attended the COP21 Paris Climate Conference so he gave us the inside story on that in Episode 16.

Albert also went to the latest Climate Conference, COP22 in Marakech and so he’ll be sharing with us what the so-called world leaders are doing about Climate Change and many other environmental issues.

There’ll be few main parts to this episode. I’m going to start out by doing a survey of kind of our basic biological human needs. So you know food, energy, shelter, connection, love that type of thing. (our global life support systems) And look at those within the context of how we go about meeting those needs and how that has changed over time especially from pre-agriculture revolution and then after the agriculture revolution and now into modern technological age.

Today’s guest is Ben Falk who created and runs Whole Systems Design out of Vermont, and is also the author of the book The Resilient Farm and Homestead. Today we discuss how to go about finding the right homestead property for natural living and some of key decisions like siting your house.

Today’s guest is film producer, author and teacher Justin Rhodes who has been running his 75 acre permaculture farm near Asheville, NC for many years. He’s here to share with us some of the many lessons he’s learned along the way, and give some pointers to those getting started.

Today’s guest, Dan Kittrege has been an organic farmer since childhood, and has been developing a deep understanding of how a nutrient rich soil leads to healthier plants and healthier foods and ultimately healthier people and planet. He created the Bionutrient Food Association to promote this understanding of growing nutrient dense food. He also runs Kittredge farm in Brookfield, MA where he does his research and practices the science.

Today’s guests Alec Gioseffi and Lauren Nagy run the CSA Farm Cooperative 518 in Princeton, New Jersey. They provide nourishing food to the local community using permaculture farming practices. The farm is home to chickens, cats, sheep, pigs, nine humans, veggies, herbs, flowers, a small upcycled greenhouse, a large seasonal hoop house, and two tiny homes.

Today’s guest is Robyn Mello. I met Robyn in November at the Advanced Permaculture Course I took in Akron, OH. I got to learn all about the non-profit she works for, the Philadelphia Orchard Project. They’re putting in public orchard and forest gardens all around Philadelphia. Robin has learned a ton about what it takes to run a successful urban agriculture focused non-profit permaculture organization so that’s the theme of today’s interview.

Today’s guest is Jesse Tack based out of Ypsilanti, Michigan. Jesse founded and helps run the very active permaculture group; Abundant Michigan Permaculture Ypsilanti. Or AMPY for short. We get to hear about how AMPY got started and has evolved since then.

Today’s guest is Kate Heiber Cobb, who created and runs the Madison Area Permaculture Guild out of Madison Wisconsin. She is a Permaculture teacher and educator, and has done a lot with bringing Permaculture to urban regions. Today we talk about her story, how she created the guild, projects they’ve done and lessons learned along the way. It keeps getting better the deeper into the interview we go so make sure to listen to the end!

That’s a taste of some of the types of things you would learn by taking a Permaculture Design Course. Today I’m talking to Rhonda Baird about why you would want to take a PDC, what it covers, and what you get out of it. Rhonda has been a Permaculture teacher for 10 years and shares her journey from taking her first PDC, to today where she has a thriving homestead and teaches numerous PDCs a year. She will also be one of the guest teachers for the upcoming PDC here in Traverse City this spring.

Today’s guest is Nathan Ayers, who heads up Chiwara Permaculture out of Ann Arbor, Michigan and is currently focusing on Flint Water Crisis Permaculture Solutions. Nathan also does a lot of work integrating permaculture into traditional educational institutions from kindergarten all the way up through the university level.

Eric Toensmeier is the award-winning author of the books Perennial Vegetables and Paradise Lot, which describes how he converted his run-down city lot into a diverse plant sanctuary in Massachusets. He was also the co-author to Dave Jacke from episode 14 on the two volume set Edible Forest Gardens. Eric has a brand new book about to come out about Carbon Farming and the strategies that agriculture can use to sequester CO2 to help mitigate climate change.

Albert Bates is a longtime influential figure in environmental activism, and the ecovillage and permaculture movements. He’s a lawyer, an author and a teacher, who has been director of the Ecovillage Training Center at The Farm in Summertown, Tennessee since 1994.

Today’s guest, Cliff Davis was telling me that having all those pigs and plants to care for makes it hard to leave home and travel to experience new cultures and perspectives. And he values those experiences for personal growth and expansion, plus their a great source for new ideas. But fortunately there’s a continual flow of students and interns coming through his place, Spiral Ridge Permaculture…

Today’s guest is Dave Jacke who has been mentioned several times already in previous episodes. He was the co-author of the book that I’m no longer allowed to call the “bible” of designing edible forest garden ecosystems, which is Edible Forest Gardens Volumes 1 and 2.

Today’s guest is Eran Rhodes of Sacred Earth Landscaping soon to be based out of his new family farm in Benzie County, Michigan. Before moving northwards, he started his own permaculture landscaping business in Chicago, traveled around working at many sustainable farms around the country, and also worked at Oikos Tree Crops nursery. Him and his family have a beautiful vision for their new farm. Check it out.

Our guest today is a creative individual who brings the community together, and connects like-minded people. She teaches and spreads permaculture, she’s an artist, a garden-farmer, a teacher, and can make a real tasty pie. She’s my good friend, Penny Krebiehl.

Today’s guests, Paul and Sharron May, run a small farm called The May Farm in Frankfort, MI near us here in the northern part of the Lower Peninsula. They apply a permaculture approach to their homestead, and farm, and have been seeing some spectacular results.

Today’s guest is Fred Meyer, who is the founder of the non-profit called Backyard Abundance in Johnson County, Iowa. Backyard Abundance creates beautiful, environmentally beneficial landscapes that produce food for humans and wildlife. Basically, Fred and his team are turning lawns into food producing ecosystems, or Forest Gardens all over town, both in public parks, and around peoples homes.

Todays guest is Mark Angelini, the other half of Roots 2 Fruits Ecological Design in Southern Michigan. We had his business partner, Trevor Newman, on here on episode 3. Mark is a generalized specialist. His work spans from art and design, to craft and woodwork, farming, gardening, forestry and of course, apple growing and cider making. Today we get to hear some updates on several of his projects, and his journies along the way.

Early in the spring this year we began using Realeyes Homestead as the commercial scale composting site for Traverse City. It has been a great partnership with Bay Area Recycling for Charities, a non-profit that created and runs the composting operation.

Todays episode focuses on water. A broad topic for sure, but a pretty important one since basically all life forms depend on access to clean water to survive. As you probably know, our bodies are 60% water. Water is vital for lubricating our joints, flushing out toxins and waste, and transporting vital nutrients to all of our cells.

We’ve still got a LOT to learn about plant propagation, grafting, pruning and the other arts of tree cultivation. We’re blessed to have many experienced tree-whispers in our region like Archangel, and today’s guest, Trevor Newman of Roots to Fruits.

Today’s guest is Samantha Graves of Healing Tree Farm at the historic DeYoungs farm in Northern Michigan. There, Samantha and her family are planting a Permaculture orchard and have had livestock like chickens, sheep and alpacas and are getting involved in fiber production. Their farm actually neighbors my families farm, and we’ve been working together for a few years now.

Today’s guest is one my good friends and mentors Peter Bane, who is one of the most experienced permaculture teachers in the midwest. He’s the author of the Permaculture Handbook; Garden Farming for Town and Country. He’s also been the publisher of Permaculture Activist magazine for 25 years, which recently changed to Permaculture Design Magazine.